Internet's oldest recurring contest shows the importance of programming style in an ironic way, to stress C compilers, to provide a safe forum for bad code. :-)
2/2
However we plan to post more detailed updates, especially when an contest is underway, directly to #mastodon:
@[email protected]
Non-mastodon users can bookmark and follow:
https://t.co/wdRpNaSJ0e
The #IOCCC joined https://t.co/ftU5GQE4lY
With the #Mastodon username:
@[email protected]
The https://t.co/AiBd5QSid7 Mastodon server is well run by a group of dedicated volunteers and has a tech focus who is well suited for the #IOCCC.
The International Obfuscated C Code Contest (#IOCCC) will abandon active use of this twitter account.
We'll post announcements (news, start dates, winners, etc.) via our new #mastodon account:
@[email protected]
Please follow us on Mastodon.
See:
https://t.co/QtO8FtqeQr
We received multiple reports that those tried to join the original Mastodon server were unable to do. That server is somewhat slow and oversubscribed.
We recommend that you instead join from one of the other well run #Mastodon servers:
https://t.co/OAcB1cx0yI
Unfortunately netlify charges for their service and has bandwidth caps. IOCCC, when winners are announced has enormous download rates that would simply be too costly for us.
By posting IOCCC winning code first w/o delay, by using the GitHub pull request process to fix/improve winners (code & writeup), and providing winners a way to update (or remove) their contact information, the overall @IOCCC will improve.
There WILL be a #IOCCC28 .. we promise!
When #IOCCC28 happens, we will have a refracted https://t.co/9EVtk5NKs9, IOCCC entry packaging tool, and improved submission process.
Winners will be announced by pushing winning source to https://t.co/9EVtk5NKs9 GitHub repo w/o delay. Winners can fix/improve via Pull requests.
We won't actually judge code submitted to #MOCKIOCCC. Winners of the MOCKIOCCC will be based on those who provide us with the best feedback, 1st to report a given bug, etc.
All this is to sure we are ready for when the real #IOCCC28 happens!
On the topic of the next IOCCC:
We are hard at work building a new entry packaging tool (written in C of course 🤓) that will significantly benefit the IOCCC.
When this packaging tool is code and test complete, we plan to invite you to comment on and test it.
The #MOCKIOCCC will be your way to provide @ioccc with valuable feedback on the IOCCC contest process.
We don't to subject the real #IOCCC28 on an untested process: hence the need for a MOCKIOCCC to be held first.
If the file was foo.html, then the browser would be given Meta Refresh HTML. However none of the winners in 1988-2004 contain HTML pages. So when we move the C source, hint files, extra files those 1988-2004 URLs will break because they are no HTML files.
We part of our refactoring of https://t.co/9EVtk5NKs9, as hosted by GitHub via our https://t.co/IyQDG3p7Eb repo, we need to move winners 1988-2004 into their own sub-directories.
Sadly Meta Refresh won't work for most non-HTML web pages, so existing URLs will break. Sorry!
GitHub's hosting of https://t.co/9EVtk5NKs9 offers limited redirect methods. We do NOT have access to GitHub's server config. Use of server side code and .htaccess is not allowed, so we are limited to using Meta Refresh.
Unfortunately Meta Refresh won't work for 1988-2004.
@fanf GitHub pages only support static HTML: things like .htaccess are unavailable.
We could use META tags to redirect a few critical pages per winner (prog.c & hint files). Not ideal: slow & litters file tree, so we wouldn't to do want this for the long term. Would that help @fanf?
We plan to change the @IOCCC layout for winners of 1988-2004 to match the per-directory layout of 1984-1987 & 2005-2020. This a needed step as we improve our web site & for how we announce future winners.
We apologize breaking any links to those entries.
https://t.co/vx5KQiSQrY